
Northern Light Health announced Thursday that on March 1 it will suspend birthing services at Northern Light Inland Hospital, pictured here, and Northern Light Women’s Health, both in Waterville. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel
WATERVILLE —Officials announced Thursday that birthing services will be suspended at Northern Light Inland Hospital and Northern Light Women’s Health in Waterville starting March 1.
“Ongoing recruiting challenges for labor and delivery providers have made it necessary to take this step,” Suzanne R. Spruce, Northern Light’s senior vice president and chief marketing and communications officer, said Thursday in a statement.
Inland Hospital is located at 200 Kennedy Memorial Drive; Women’s Health is at 180 Kennedy Memorial Drive.
The suspension leaves Waterville with no birthing services. Redington-Fairview Hospital in Skowhegan is 18 miles from Waterville; MaineGeneral Health’s Alfond Center for Health in Augusta is 16 miles away; and Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor is 62 miles.
“The decision to suspend a service like this is never easy,” Spruce said. “This decision was made after much thoughtful discussion and with careful consideration given to how to best care for expecting parents in the community.”
She said the suspension allows Northern Light time to design a new program that supports consistent access to high-quality prenatal care and labor and delivery for the communities it serves, and which patients expect and deserve.
“Our team will be working with our current expecting patients to transition their care to the provider and facility of their choice,” she said. “We are confident that by working together with our colleagues at MaineGeneral Health, Redington-Fairview Hospital, and other Northern Light Health facilities, all expecting parents in Waterville and the surrounding area will have access to the birthing experience they want and deserve.”
Asked when she expects Northern Light to have a new program and when birthing services might return to Waterville, Spruce said: “There is not a definitive decision timeline as it will be dependent on recruitment, but we do plan to reevaluate in six months.”
The suspension follows a shakeup at Northern Light that started last fall when EMMC’s president Greg LaFrancois stepped down, followed by the resignation of Inland’s president the next day. Tricia Costigan had served in the latter position since May 2022.
Northern Light Health had been making changes for months before the shakeup in an effort to transform care delivery and access to address patient needs, Spruce said at the time.
The changes, she said, were designed to provide high quality, consistent care for patients, invest in critical staff and equipment and ensure access to health care for people in Maine, then and in the future.
Some of the changes affected the administrative structure of the organization, such as the leadership changes which helped reduce operational costs, while creating shared oversight roles and responsibilities to better align services — for staff and the communities they serve.
Late last year, Northern Light also announced that 500 food service and housekeeping jobs at Northern Light Health acute care locations in Maine would be taken over by another company starting Jan. 1, 2025.
Compass One Healthcare now provides food, nutrition and hospitality services to locations including Northern Light Inland Hospital and Northern Light Continuing Care, Lakewood. No layoffs would occur, and all employees affected by the change would have a chance to transition their employment to Compass One, Spruce said at the time.
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